


Vices

by TintedPink



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen, M/M, Post-Avengers (2012), Pre-Slash, but was using alcohol as an unhealthy coping mechanism, never an alcoholic!TOny, smoker!Steve, steve misses the past
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-30
Updated: 2018-09-29
Packaged: 2019-07-20 11:07:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16135970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TintedPink/pseuds/TintedPink
Summary: Steve smokes sometimes, because even though it’s not the same as it was in the forties it’s familiar, and if he closes his eyes he can almost pretend his whole life wasn’t swept out form under him.





	Vices

**Author's Note:**

> This has probably been done before, but I needed it.  
> Cross posted to [Tumblr](https://iwritefanficsometimes.tumblr.com/post/178433432914/vices)

He’s seen all the new evidence and he knows that it’s not a thing people really do anymore. It’s stopped being strange not to see someone smoking in a restaurant or in the street or at a school. Steve smoked and sometimes he smokes again just for the nostalgia of it. It doesn’t give him the same kick anymore, he still hates the smell, and now that his sense of taste is as good as his hearing and sight they’re awful to suck on, but they’re familiar. He remembers buying a pack and smoking with Bucky mild summer nights while they shot the shit and he can’t help it if the bitter taste in his mouth isn’t completely from the cigarettes.

He has to find places to hide to smoke. Stark tower’s windows don’t open but Tony has some nice balconies and Steve has ash trays hidden on all of them.

It’s a mild summer night when Tony finds him half way through a pack and lost in memories.

“That stuff’ll kill you, you know.” Tony has a tumbler in his hand and the amber liquid could be anything, but Steve guesses whiskey.

He stubs out the cigarette he wasn’t really done with and fans the smoke away from Tony. “It’d kill you a lot faster.”

“I’m happy with my vices, thanks, but please, don’t stop on my account.” Tony settles himself against the rail, looking over the railing at the city scape that was becoming familiar to Steve but still always felt foreign at first glance.

Steve watched Tony warily, but he didn’t seem to be moving, and he was upwind so he lit another cigarette, using a match, because the lighters made them taste funny.

Tony takes a sip of his whiskey when Steve lights up and they sit there, sucking down their respective poisons and they don’t speak. When Tony finishes he leaves the glass on the edge of the balcony and Steve picks it up when he’s had his last cigarette to take it to the kitchen. He takes a whiff, to see if he was right it being whiskey, and smells… apples and sugar. He doesn’t mention it when Tony comes out the next time he’s smoking. Just keeps Tony down wind and smokes half a pack before going inside.

Tony follows shortly.

It becomes a routine. If Steve is having a smoke Tony has a drink that he pretends is alcoholic. Steve wonders if the act is for his benefit or Tony’s.

Eventually they start talking, more specifically Steve starts talking, about all the things he misses, and the things that are different, “I can’t go back, but at least I can have a cigarette and pretend some things are still the same.”

Tony doesn’t say anything, and he leaves first that night, tumbler barely touched and a distant look on his face.

The next time Steve is pretty sure Tony won’t be there, but he is, glass in hand, same casual lab clothes with the grease stain on the shoulder. This time Tony talks. “My dad gave me my first drink when I was six. He said it would put hair on my chest. I guess I do it because it’s familiar, too.” He shoots the whole thing and then leaves again. Steve only smokes one cigarette that night.

“Howard’s a dick.” Steve tells Tony before he even gets to the railing. Steve had barely lit his first smoke of the evening when he heard Tony approaching.

“Yeah.” Tony said, “So’s ice.”

Steve laughs and it’s good. It’s good to laugh at his own pain, because it makes it hurt less.

Tony laughs too and Steve looks at him. It’s a good laugh, no tinge of bitterness to it. Steve stubs out his cigarette so he can walk across the balcony and wrap Tony up in a hug. Tony tenses at first but he doesn’t take long to hug Steve back. It’s good. Steve reminds himself that he has friends like Tony now, and that he’ll be okay. He hopes Tony tells himself the same thing.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [Tumblr](Https://iwritefanficsometimes.tumblr.com)


End file.
